The Fabulous Life of Decorator to the Stars Elsie de Wolfe

In a 1936 photograph, Elsie de Wolfe (far left) sits next to actress and opera star Grace Moore at a party at Pickfair, the home of Mary Pickford. Joining them are Moore’s husband, actor Valentín Parera, and Princess Vasili Romanov.

In 1945 De Wolfe—also widely known as Lady Mendl after her marriage to British former spy Sir Charles Mendl—signed a paper lampshade (left, center) from the Players restaurant in Los Angeles. Other signers include Frank Sinatra, Mary Pickford, Hedy Lamarr, and Charlie Chaplin.

Shortly before Paris was overrun by Nazis, Sir Charles and Lady Mendl fled to Portugal, driving in their 1934 Rolls-Royce Phantom II Sedanca de Ville. The car is now exhibited at Colorado’s Intrigue Auto Collection.

Ludwig Bemelmans sketched Lady Mendl at After All, her Beverly Hills, California, home; she is seated with one of her toy poodles.

In 1948, photographer Julius Shulman visited After All, the Hollywood residence of the Mendls. While there, he photographed a table setting on an outdoor terrace where ivy leaves serve as place cards, with names written in white ink.

Director’s chairs with green-and-white-striped fabric surround the dining table on After All’s garden pavilion, which is set with ceramic lettuce-leaf plates and a lettuce-tureen centerpiece.

For Lady Mendl’s bedroom at After All, the decorator and her assistant, Hilda West, découpaged a secretary with prints of fruits and flowers.

Lady Mendl in her Beverly Hills living room, with her poodle Blu-Blu, in 1944. Silk-taffeta cushions embroidered with mottoes were among the decorator’s trademarks. The one shown declares, “It needs a stout heart to live without roots,” attributed to her friend the novelist Erich Maria Remarque.

The living room of After All; artist Tony Duquette custom decorated the secretary at left, as well as the window blinds and the pedestals that flank the arch.

After All’s entrance hall, with fanciful accents made by Tony Duquette.

One end of After All’s drawing room featured a mirrored wall and fireplace; the painted wall pockets are by Tony Duquette, as are the figural flower stands at either end of the mantel; Chinese tables stand alongside the white-damask sofas.

The garden pavilion featured a mirrored interior wall that amplified the garden. Its arch is emblazoned with a passage from Shakespeare’s Richard III: “Shine out, fair sun, till I have bought a glass, that I may see my shadow as I pass.”

Lady Mendl’s bed, appliquéd with flowers, was placed against a sheet of mirror that reflected the French doors to the balcony. Flanking the bed are Tony Duquette artworks incorporating Lady Mendl’s personal emblem (a wolf) and the initial M (for Mendl).

Artist Tony Duquette, seated in After All’s drawing room; to his right is a two-tiered round table that Frederick P. Victoria made for Lady Mendl.

Tony Duquette’s major work of art for After All was what Lady Mendl called “the meuble”—her living room’s secretary. He decorated the department-store find with hand-painted scenes, lined it with mirror, and topped it with fanciful figures.

Lady Mendl (right) poses with actress Kay Francis in 1936. Francis, known as one of Hollywood’s best-dressed stars, was a neighbor of Sir Charles and Lady Mendl in Beverly Hills.

Actress Marlene Dietrich poses beside a dressing table in the Lady Mendl–decorated house she rented from Dorothy di Frasso, a lively Hollywood hostess. The di Frasso house is presently on the market for $29.5 million through Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices.

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